In the past our Company was part of the international network of publishers experimenting the Multiplying the Media Effect Research Programme. In Italy, as with all the countries where these experiments were carried out, the results substantially confirmed the enormous increase in the efficacy of communication when the Periodical Press is added to a planned use of Commercial TV. From these Research Programmes the multiplying effect has appeared so relevant that now Arnoldo Mondadori Editore, which in the meantime has become part of the Multinational and Multimedia Fininvest Group, is concentrating more on the extraordinary increase in communicative effectiveness resulting from this Multiplier effect than on the traditional competition between the two media Commercial TV and Periodical Press.
Two years after the October 1987 launch of the Italian edition of the women's monthly Marie Claire, product of the collaboration between Arnoldo Mondadori Editore and the French publisher Marie Claire Album (Prouvost Group), the title has, on the one hand, obtained very successful circulation (about 170 copies) , while, on the other hand, obtaining a very low number of readers per copy (about 3.5 with respect to about 6.5 readers per copy of the title's main competitor Elle and also in relation to the whole segment of high-target women's weeklies, which float between over 10 readers per copy for Arnica and around 7 readers per copy for Grazia, Gioia and Anna). This paper will describe the main results of a monthly editorial monitor (a nationwide telephone survey carried out among purchasers of each issue). The results show a unique relationship between the magazine and its target (high overall evaluation, many articles read, long time spent reading each issue, strong habit of collecting the issues, etc.). The paper will clearly demonstrate that the "total number of readers" is not the only way of evaluating media performance and that measurement of the quality of the Magazine/Target relationship can be improved. This is obviously the case when a low number of readers per copy (Marie Claire) is clearly due to the very high involvement between the magazine and its target.
The Marketing Oriented approach and the use of appropriate tools in terms of Advertising and Market Research permit to obtain successful results not only in the traditional Mass Market markets, but also in the market of pocket books sold by Bookshops.
In view of the decline in birthrate which has occurred in industrialised countries, the companies operating in the Youths' Products Markets are faced with serious problems both with regard to the decreased number of youths and with regard to the lack of adequate and timely information about present general sociological changes in the Youths' population. This paper illustrates an initiative promoted by Arnoldo Mondadori Editore in this respect.
The paper illustrates the first application in Italy of two new qualitative variables applied to the study of readership.
The paper illustrates the first application in Italy of two new qualitative variables applied to the study of readership.
The research, which was carried out in different phases (qualitative/quantitative) and with a sophisticated methodology on a final sample of 3000 women, clearly highlighted the greatest variability of the universe of Italian women. A particularly distinct clusters analysis emerged which allowed the segmentation of the Female World into 6 Groups characterised according to the attitude towards the role of women in the Italian society today. The research clearly shows how consistently women's attitudes and behaviours vary as the fundamental attitude towards the woman's role changes with regard to a wide range of areas concerning the everyday life (the family, the children, the work, religion, sex, political involvement, consumption behaviour and exposure to media). In consideration of the size of the areas studied and of the greatest articulation focused on the Italian women's reality, a number of qualitative hypotheses of evolutive prediction have been drawn from this paper.
This paper shows the possible application to certain publishing sectors of some Market Research methodologies already tested in the Marketing of consumer goods. In this particular case, the Market Research programme carried out before launching the Harmony Collection on the Italian Market has enabled decisions to be made about the actual launch and the necessary investment on the basis of adequate information on market potential as well as on the validity of the "product" Marketing Mix.
Over the last 4-5 years there has been, in Italy, a rapid growth of book clubs as against a fairly contained growth of book sales in the book stores. This rapid growth has been caused by a type of public which is generally different from that of Book Store Customers and which finds in the Book Clubs the following two advantages: - Help in overcoming uncertainty in the choice of books; - Practical/Organisational Reasons.